The Last Star (The 5th Wave, #3)(29)

I shake my head. “I’m coming with you.”

She flashes that goddamned stupid smile. “Honey, you don’t want to do that.”

“Why?”

“Our cover story won’t fly if there’s anyone around to contradict it.”

The vise around my stomach tightens another turn. Survivors. Constance is going to kill everyone she finds hiding in those caves, and that’s probably a lot of people. Dozens, maybe hundreds. It will be tough work. They’ll be well-armed and wary of strangers—it’s hard to imagine that anyone’s unaware of the 4th Wave this late in the game. Which means I might not have to kill Constance after all. Maybe they’ll do it for me.

It’s a pleasant thought. Unrealistic, but pleasant. My next thought is not pleasant at all, so I blurt out the first thing that pops into my head.

“We don’t need to take the caverns. We can intercept Zombie before he gets there.”

Constance shakes her head. “Not our orders.”

“Our orders are to rendezvous with Zombie,” I argue. I’m not letting this go. If I let it go, innocent people will die. I’m not totally against people dying—I am planning to kill her and Evan Walker—but this is avoidable.

“I know it bothers you, Marika,” she says kindly. “That’s why I’m going in solo.”

“It’s a stupid risk.”

“You’ve reached a conclusion without knowing all the facts,” she scolds me.

That’s been a problem from the beginning—as in the beginning of human history.

My hand drops to the butt of my sidearm. She doesn’t miss it. Her answering smile lights up the night.

“You know what happens if you do that,” she says gently, a kindly aunt, a caring big sister. “Your friends—the ones you’ve come back for—how many lives are their lives worth? If a hundred had to die so they could live, or a thousand, or ten thousand, or ten million . . . When would you say enough?”

I know this argument. It’s Vosch’s. It’s theirs. What are seven billion lives when existence itself is at stake? My throat burns. I can taste stomach acid in my mouth.

“It’s a false choice,” I answer. One last try, a plea: “You don’t have to kill anyone to get Walker.”

She shrugs. Apparently, I’m just not getting it. “If I don’t, neither of us is going to live long enough to have that chance.” She lifts her chin and turns her face slightly away. “Hit me.” Taps her right cheek. “Here.”

Why not? The blow rocks her back on her heels. She shakes her head impatiently, turns the other cheek. “Again. Harder this time, Marika. Hard.”

I hit her harder. Hard enough to break bone. Her left eye immediately begins to swell. She feels no pain from the punch. Neither do I.

“Thanks,” she says brightly.

“No problem. Anything else you need busted, let me know.”

She laughs softly. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear she likes me, finds me charming. Then she’s gone so quickly that only enhanced vision like mine could follow her, zipping across the field to the road that leads to the caverns, then cutting into the woods on the northwest side.

As soon as she’s out of sight, I sink to the ground, shaky, light-headed, my gut churning. I’m beginning to wonder if something is wrong with the 12th System. I feel like shit.

I lean against the cold metal of the silo and close my eyes. The darkness behind my lids spins around an invisible center, the singularity before the universe was born. Teacup is there, falling away from me; the blast from Razor’s weapon resounds in timeless space. She falls away, but she will always be mine.

Razor is there, too, in the absolute center of absolute nothing, the blood still fresh on his arm from the self-inflicted wound, VQP, and he knew the cost of sacrificing Teacup would be his own life. I’m certain by the time we spent the night together, he’d already decided to kill her—because killing her was the only way to set me free.

Free me to do what, Razor? Endure so I can conquer what?

With my eyes still closed, I pull the combat knife from the sheath strapped to my calf. I can imagine Razor lingering in the doorway to the warehouse; the golden light from the pyre outside washing over his lean features; his eyes lost in shadow as he rolls up his sleeve. The knife in his hand then. The knife in my hand now. He probably winced when the tip broke the skin. I do not.

I feel nothing. I am cocooned in nothingness, the answer, after all, to Vosch’s riddle of why? I can smell Razor’s blood. I can’t smell mine, because none breaks the surface of the wound; thousands of microscopic drones stanch the flow.

V: How do you conquer the unconquerable?

Q: Who can win when no one can endure?

P: What endures when all hope is gone?

Out of the singularity, a voice cries out. “My dear child, why do you cry?”

I open my eyes.

It’s a priest.





24


AT LEAST, he’s dressed like one.

Black pants. Black shirt. White collar, yellowed by sweat, spotted with rust-colored stains. He’s standing just outside my reach, a small guy with a receding hairline and a pudgy, babyish face. He sees the wet knife in my hand and immediately raises his.

“I am not armed.” His voice is high-pitched, as childlike as his features.